CALSTOCK in Bloom is celebrating its horticultural successes yet again after winning a Gold award for the second year running in the Britain in Bloom competition.

Last week, the volunteer gardening group were presented a Gold award in the village pennant category at the South West in Bloom Awards ceremony held at Truro Cathedral.

South West in Bloom is one of 18 regional/national competitions that make up Britain in Bloom, the biggest horticultural campaign in Europe.

After winning a Gold award in the village pennant category last year and the Vic Verrier Trophy — for the Best New Entry, the Calstock group’s win this year affirms the group’s horticultural prowess.

A handful of the group’s members attended the ceremony, one of which was Colin Bates, chair of Calstock in Bloom who explained that they were unaware if they had won an award until they were invited on stage to join the mayor of Truro.

Following the win, Colin said: “We’re very happy with the result. It’s the second year running we’ve won Gold so now we can say it’s a trend and not just a one off. We’re obviously getting it right.”

A well-deserved celebratory drink was had when the group returned back to the village.

The awards recognise high standards in terms of horticulture, environment and community. One of the group’s main focuses this year was to create a Mediterranean-style bed in the village car park planted with drought-resistant plants and plants which attracts pollinators and were helped by children creating a bug hotel called ‘Bugingham Palace’, both of which impressed the judges.

For this group, the main driving force is encouraging community involvement and to do the village proud, objectives that they have achieved both this year and the last with the unwavering community support behind them.

Colin continued: “Although we’ve entered the competition on the two years we’ve been around, we’ve all said well actually it’s always been about doing something for the village, it wasn’t about entering Britain in Bloom.”

This year saw the Calstock community pool its efforts into brightening up the village with the group receiving donations from local residents and businesses and support with planting too.

Colin explained that the feedback the group received from the judges was highly complimentary about how they involve the community and Colin said this confirmed why they do it.

Looking forward, the team is preparing for its Curry and Disco Fundraiser which is a sell-out event set to take place this weekend.

“It’s great as again the community is getting behind us”, said Colin.

Moreover, on Sunday, October 29, the group is holding a community bulb-planting event with the ambition of getting help from the locals with planting 4,000 daffodil bulbs in the bank at the back of the football pitch so that, come spring, there will be a host of golden daffodils.

Colin added: “We want everyone to come down, they just need to bring a spade.”